I love taking showers...

...because when I get out I find little surprises. Like this:

Let's hear it for fine motor skills, Lilly!

Silly Rabbit!

Has it really been that long since I posted???

So I was thinking lately of (Great) Grandma Sykes and how she used to call us "honey lamb" sometimes. I decided to give it a try for fun. When I called Will "honey lamb" he looked at me weird. Lilly's turn. I was helping her out of the van when I told her, "Jump down, honey lamb." Lilly got mad and told me, "I'm Lilly. I'm honey rabbit!" I quickly agreed and was quickly puzzled. She does love that stuffed rabbit of hers, that must be it. Maybe.

Hum...

After a few minutes, it sunk in: what I usually call Lilly is "honey bunny"! No wonder she was so mad. Silly Mom.

The Ham

Okay, so I didn't do a post last week so I'd better do two this week, right? Well, mostly I need to do one because Will hasn't had his fair share of blogtime. (That sounds so lame.)

So I was reading over my journal from June of this year and found some grand stuff on Will and I couldn't decide which part to put in so I decided to put it all in! It starts with Father's Day:

Tonight I was putting Will down (David was gone—had two meetings on Father’s Day night! I had to swear about that!) and before I started singing to him while he was lying in bed I was softly kissing Will’s elbow. I was kind-of doing it absent-mindedly and not giving much thought to it until he took his arm away and started blowing fiercely on his arm, turning it over and over trying to get down to his elbow. “What are you doing?” I asked him. He answered, “Nothing… (pause) trying to get something off…kisses...I don’t like them on me.”

Sheesh, sorry.

So after Will sanitized his arm, I sang him the Nephi song, “I will go, I will do, the thing the Lord commands…” and then Will told me it was time for him to sing his song. What?? Will has never sung me a song. He’s just now saying the prayer by himself! So Will launched into his own beatiful one-lined song, “The thing is a predatory thing!” Ah, music to a mother’s ears.

Yesterday at 7 Peaks (I was at 7 Peaks alone with the 4 kids—Dave was at Youth Conference) I was in the wave pool with the kids and Will morphed into some kind of animal. (I never found out which kind of animal it actually was.) He started stalking around in the water, biting the waves with his mighty jaws and scooping up fish in what must have been claws. He came over to me and told me that he was Keek-cess and that I should watch how Keek-cess swam and caught fish which I did with much interest. I’m sure everyone around us found my Keek-cess son very interesting too.

Today after church Keek-cess returned. This time Keek-cess was jumping off the fireplace mantle. And at bedtime, Keek-cess had a new improved name that Will had to say four times to get right and I had to repeat eight times to get right: Keek-a-boo-cuss-es. I wonder if he will remember that in the morning? I guess that’s why I keep a journal.

June 19, 2007 Will held up four fingers, “What does this spell?” I answered, “Four?” He corrected me, “No…cinnamon roll!” Then he held up seven fingers, “What does this spell?” Anne added her two cents and she answered, “Ten!” Will got mad, “No! I’m spelling food!” He was pretty mad and added the correct answer, “Cereal.” Lastly he held up 10 fingers, “What does this spell?” Of course I was cluelss so he explained, “Oatmeal.” Good to know.





Also on 6/19 someone tooted and added, “Excuse me.” Will responded, “You’re welcome.”

Sniff, sniff, peep, peep...

January 17th, 2004 we were at the gas station getting gas in the Geo and the three kids were scrunched in the back. Anne and Isaac were going at it fighting like cats and dogs and I was so frustrated I asked the kids, “Are we going to have to leave someone here?” and Anne immediately burst in to panicked tears, “You said that families can be together forever!!”

Also...




It was sometime in January (I don’t remember the exact day) but we were having dinner and for some reason we were talking about Easter. Isaac had a vague memory of last Easter and he was associating Easter with those horrid sugar-coated marshmallow “Peeps” but he couldn’t remember exactly what they were. He asked, “When it’s Easter can we pick eggs and see what’s in them and get the bawk-bawks?”

Do you think "Bawk-bawks" are the grown up version of "Peeps"?

Isaac's Wack Job

Another post from my April 2003 journal--boy, I'm having fun reading it! Someday when things slow down (ha ha ha ha ha) I'll post something "never before published." As for now, cut and paste it is!

Recently I spent a day on the laundry room, organizing, straightening, de-junking, etc. Soon after I finished, Isaac went in the laundry room and I can’t remember who made the first comment about it being clean but he immediately picked up on the fact that Anne’s robe (in the dirty laundry basket) was kind-of hanging out, 3/4 of the way in, some of it on the floor. Isaac pointed that out: “One cloe is kinda on the floor, huh?” Apparently “cloe” is singular for “clothes.”


Along those same lines, a few days later, I had Will on the changing table and had a major diaper on my hands and I was preoccupied to say the least (Will has lightning fast hands when the diaper is undone) and in came Isaac carrying something in his fingers for me. A wonderful time to receive something from Isaac but he dutifully explained, “Here mom--here’s a ear wack.” My response (still processing): “Thank.”

Cloe is to clothes as wack is to wax.

Time for Anne and Isaac...

Today's blog is a cut-and-paste from my 2003 journal. At this point, Will is almost 2 months old, Anne is 5 and Isaac 3. Oh, and "lunchgroup" was a pain-in-the-you-know invention where a group of about 5 girls Anne's age traded turns having lunch at each others' houses. I'm such a beefer. (Oh, oops, too much personal info.)


On Saturday, April 5th, 2003 the kids had some interesting prayers. Anne has been practicing bearing her testimony in her prayers lately. She said the dinnertime prayer and my favorite line was, “And I know Heavenly Father is a true prophet...”

That night at bedtime prayers Isaac said it and his train of thought went somthing like, “And Heavenly Father created us and He wanted to create us and bless the food and it’s not the food time and it’s not dinner....”

Monday, April 7th was Anne’s lunchgroup here and while the girls were eating Will woke up and started crying and we started talking about how Will was hungry and wanted his lunch and Madison piped up that her baby eats here (pointing to chest) on her mom (her brother was born 12/19/02 before Will) and blah blah blah. Anne was quick to point out that Will ate the same way and she also explained to the girls: “Moms have the milk and dads have the Priesthood.” Is that how that trade-off works? I guess it would not work to have both, true.

Off on the right foot...

Let's get this straight: It was inevitable that I someday start a blog. After all, Bekah just told me about Dad's bookmarks on his Mac and I thought, "Methinks it's time to add another." Plus, all my friends are doing it. I'm like, the only one on the block that doesn't have like a blog address. And today in one of our email exchanges (that I always have to repent for afterwards) Bekah addressed me as "Blogger." Hum.

But really, I do like writing. I used to write in my journal. I don't know what happened to that. Can writing a post on your blog count as writing in your journal? Oh, good. But don't worry! This isn't going to be about me. A few weeks ago Dave FORBADE me to ever have a blog. I can't remember the last time David forbade me to do something. Wait, he's never forbidden me to do anything. Actually, what was worrying Dave was that if I had a blog the details of our life were going to be hung out like laundry for the whole world to read. So let's get this straight: this blog will not contain personal information about the blogger. When I kept a journal I didn't even write much about me in it and so you can rest assured, Dave, that this blog will be the same.

I chose the blog title "Mom will you please read us this??" because I thought of the journal Mark Mulcahey sent in 2002 that I filled with quotes and little stories about the kids (Anne, 4, and Isaac, 2, at the time) and how Anne and Isaac now constantly bring that journal to me, pleading, "Mom, will you please read us this??" So I'm going to write about the funny things my kids do and say. The intended audience: Bekah and Dad (to help keep the dinner conversation on a lighter note) and Emily if she ever gets a new job and has time to waste on reading a blog and Dave if he gets over being mad that I disobeyed him. No one else will have the blog address. Let's not get our hopes up too high either. I'll feel like I'm doing good if I can get a quote posted once per week.



So with all that established, I will start with a really juicy story from yesterday. For background, Lilly has been in panties going on about 3 weeks. She's done so well but you already knew that because you know that my kids are so smart they scare me. And you. So yesterday morning I was in the shower and Lilly came in crying and I peeked out the shower door to see she was standing there naked. Hum. She was telling me, "Fall dooowwwwnnn!!!" Hum. It seemed kind of puzzling that she seemed so upset. She usually bounces back fast from a little fall. But it WAS weird that she was naked and upset. I still wasn't that worried because as you know from the Provo Police Department I don't worry about my kids as much as pet owners worry about their dogs. So I finished my shower and chased Lilly down to stop her streaking which she was thoroughly enjoying at this point. To fetch her clothes I had to go down the hall to Isaac's room and mid-way down the hall was Lilly's purple plastic potty (okay, it's not purple but I couldn't resist). Hum. Lilly was accompanying me and told me, "Show Mom. Fall down." Oh dear. I first felt the carpet. Damp. Rather damp. Then I slowly lifted the lid: sure enough, there was what was left after the rest of the stuff had slogged out onto the carpet. Both kinds. I peered into the bathroom. Yep, there too. Then I thought about what Lilly had gone through: "Oh, mom's in the shower. I've got to "go"! Well, I can at least get all my clothes off. There. I know how this goes. Whew, I made it! Mom's going to be so happy! I'll go show her! (lift, grunt, slog...step, step, trip, slog, fall...) WWWAAAAAAAA!!! (run, run, run...) Mom! Fall dooowwwnnn!! Oh, mom looked at me. I'm better now...and I'm still naked! Wa-hoo!" (twirl, twist, dance, dance dance, spread spread spread germs all over the rest of the house)

I just could not get mad one bit. Just so dang disgusted. But disgusted with a smile on my face while Lilly was watching.




The End.

Have I whetted your appetite for more stories? This is a good one to share at the dinnertable tonight. And there's no way I can post blogs like this with any regularity. Will and Lilly have spent the last 20 minutes scotch taping their baby dolls into their blankets. Oh well, at least I can now officially answer to the title of "Blogger." Thanks, Bekah!